What is an API?

At Convalytics, we specialize in building APIs to extend the functionality of your business. Unfortunately for us, many people don’t know what an API is or what they can do.

An API or “Application Programming Interface” allows two separate applications to “talk” to each other. This provides a secure and generic connection between applications to add some functionality. Neither app needs to know how the other works. One app simply makes a request that the other app understands, and that app responds with new information.

Let’s look at our Patriot Search API as an example. Your internal system is very complex, and the code behind our Patriot Search API is also fairly complex. However, to connect them you simply send a borrower’s name to our API and we respond with a match score. This can be done in as few as 10 lines of code. Your system can change and even our code can change. As long as the request and response are the same, everything continues to work. This is the magic of using APIs to extend the functionality of your system.

The beautiful thing about having Convalytics build an API for you is that we don’t need to know anything about your system for it to work. You tell us what functionality you’d like to have. We only need to know what inputs you’ll provide and what outputs you’d like to receive. The rest is essentially black box magic.

Save on internal technology costs

In many businesses, your technology is your competitive differentiator. However, we all know they don’t have the resources to build everything. Adding more projects adds to your overhead costs for project management and coordination among teams. By using Convalytics to compliment your existing technology resources, you are able to get the functionality your business needs without distracting internal resources from more strategic projects.

We also offer flat pricing for our projects. We work with you to define the requirements and once clear deliverables are identified, we provide a single price for all work to be completed. It doesn’t matter if we need to engage additional resources or work overtime. You can rest easy knowing the price will never change. *(Of course, the one caveat to this is dreaded “scope creep”. If you’d like to add (or remove) features during the course of development, we may need to adjust the price accordingly.) The main benefit is that you don’t need to worry about us finishing 90% of your project for 150% of your budget.